St Maxwell's Fire
by Jayni
Summary: Firstperson Duo narrative, looking back on his college years. AU. Incomplete Series Fic. Unbetaed. 1xR. 2R. Duo POV. Gratuitous 80's references.
1. Part I

My mother and father died in a car accident when I was a baby. I would tell myself that I couldn't miss what I didn't have. That worked for a while. I had my Aunt Helen, who I could happily accuse of loving me too much. So even when there would be parent days at school, or if I would visiting my friend's nuclear home - I didn't feel like I was missing very much in my home life.

But then there was her.

I knew university would be a whole different ballpark, even if I never played a sport in my entire life and the metaphor was entirely wasted on the likes of me. I didn't feel so bad being a scholarship kid since, frankly, tuition these days is ludicrous. Everyone I knew applied for financial aid, even Quatre Raberba Winner, heir to the illustrious Winner fortune. Apparently, no matter how rich you are, having twenty-nine daughters and one son in change will break the bank.

But like I said, then I met _her_.

When I arrived, she was already in her third year and living in the all-girls honours dormitory on the other side of campus. Apparently, it wasn't enough to codify by gender, but put you in your academic place. The brochures advertise them as "fertile for discussion with one's peers"... in other words, "The really smart and beautiful ones go over here, while everyone else can find somewhere else to rest their heads." I suppose they devised the single-sex honours dorms to lessen distraction for the occupants. Frankly, I think it was damn inconsiderate for everybody else - I probably speak for every guy on campus that the distraction is there that cannot be ignored. Between the guys who say they've been in there, to what we think goes on in there, and what the girls insist never goes on happen - there's plenty of distraction.

Especially since _she_ lived there.

Relena Darlian Peacecraft. Her mother divorced her Relena's father when Relena was in high school, and remarried just before she entered university. Between the alimony from the first husband, and the gym her stepfather donated to the school, she could've been made. I heard about her before I even met her - from Quatre. Apparently his father had been invited to her mother's second wedding - the Peacecrafts and the Winners were long time competitors in politics and business alike, but they kept up civil appearances. At least that's how Quatre describes it. He told me that from what he knew of her, she was a total brat. He told me that there were rumours about her and her older stepbrother, Zechs, who is an assistant professor in the History department. Quatre told me all of this because he caught me staring at her as she did laps around the track.

Yes, she's beautiful. Blonde hair, blue-eyed, into sports, honours... and of course Quatre as my friend, he was just looking out for me. But I knew him - I knew him well enough to know that he probably never met her. I knew his family well enough to know how his father talked about competition and allies alike. I didn't blame him for it; really, it was just something to keep in mind when he spoke about people he knew through his family. And I even kept his comments in mind when I finally did meet her.

She was in one of my first-year English classes - she was a year away from finishing her Communications program, and she had to catch up on some electives. Even though first-year classes are huge, she was pretty easy to spot. All you had to do was watch where all the guys' heads were turning.

Admittedly, coupled with the little that Quatre had told me... seeing all the guys pay that much attention put me off at first. Very briefly. Fresh out of high school, the little I knew about girls was when they drew that much attention, it was for one of two reasons: no one could have her, or everyone had. But, at the very least, high school taught me that life wasn't all black and white, and that lesson didn't change with the scenery.

I would discover that same day that she was also in my tutorial. The whole tutorial business really threw me off at first - in high school, class and lecture were rolled into a neat forty-five minute episode. Figuring out that they had to split it up for both the teachers and the students sake didn't really seem all that helpful... especially considering tutorials were run by graduate students who were probably taken the class for the first time just like you were. But there wasn't exactly anyone to complain to; especially when Relena Peacecraft sits down next to you once a week and you can look forward to it every week for fourteen weeks. There wasn't any assigned seating or anything, just most people sit in the same place for most of the semester, unless the previous class messes with the tables or something.

It didn't take long to figure out what kind of popular she was - the "no one could have" variety. It took all of two glances and a double-take. Between the scribbled hearts on her notebook, to the little sticker picture on her agenda, and the heartbreaking class ring hanging from a chain around her neck - it was too big to possible be hers. All the signs were there. If she noticed me looking, she never called me on it. Maybe she was just used to it by then.

Relena Darlian Peacecraft was engaged to be married to Heero Yuy, exported son of a Japanese car manufacturer; I was so informed by Quatre. They were into their third year, and the question got popped somewhere over the last Christmas break. The Yuys were another acquaintance of the Winners, and when he told me as much, I expected to hear an earful about Heero. But Quatre was even surprised himself that he didn't know much about him - just that he lived in the all-boys honours dormitory which stood behind ours. As far as investigating Mr. Yuy and his suitability for Relena, Quatre and I would have to resort to outside methods.

Being in a class with someone is not really getting to know them in any coffee house sense. You see them on a regular basis, but there really isn't a lot of time to talk about the meaning of life, or exchange zodiacs. Generally, it starts out with, "Hey, I'm . What else are you taking?" and the rest you mostly learn from paying attention. Half listening to conversations during the break, or when she answered questions in lecture or tutorial, or the way she creased her brow when she was rolling something over in her head. All the little things that you catch that make you want to get to know them - to find something in common, to find something to talk about. But then there's this nagging - I mean, after all, the classroom is a highly controlled environment, which prevents and protects people from getting too close. I probably wouldn't have had the courage to approach her outside of class if we hadn't been paired together for a presentation.

I remember hearing, "Peacecraft, Maxwell" and thinking, 'Did I say that out loud?' I was young and stupid - younger and stupider - and maybe had one or two dreams about marrying her. They usually came the night after hanging out at Quatre's house, where his sisters would proceed to force us into watch a Sandra Bullock movie. Of course I didn't ever really want to marry her, or even like the idea of jumping that way ahead of myself - I mean, really. Honestly, I didn't. But when I heard it, I couldn't help but think it. As if the girl didn't have enough names already.

I also remember blurting out dumbly, "Huh?" since I had been paying little if any attention. Like I said, distractions were everywhere. I was a deer caught in headlights as the entire class stopped and looked at me, reading my totally lost expression. But it was the first time I made her giggle, so it was worth it.


	2. Part II

I know a few things now that I couldn't have known then. Things I probably didn't want to come to realize at the time, for whatever reason.

Like, for instance, when someone tells you they heard from a guy who heard from a guy who had been in the honours dormitory that girls walk around in their underwear freely in the hallways - to take it for face value as just talk. When a guy gets into upper levels of the all-girls dorm, the last thing on his mind is panty inspection - he's too busy just trying to make sure he doesn't come out as dog meat. However, at the time, when I would see Relena walking down the hallway side by side with any girl coming out of the dorm - I was happy to think it was true.

When someone told me that they heard from some guy who knew a girl once who told him that she had a shower with another girl... it gets you that much more curious about the inner workings of a single-sex dorm.

It's like when you see Catholic school uniforms: you just can't help but wonder. Do they like wearing the uniforms? Would they wear them outside of school if you asked them to? Young and stupid questions like that... which all seem perfectly reasonable to ask at the time (though it's usually safer to keep it from being said out loud).

So when Quatre asked me, "Why?" as in, "Why Relena?" it just seemed like one of those young and stupid questions that would get a young and stupid answer.

"Uh well, she's really pretty and smart."

What else can you say? I mean, you're in a class with a girl, you see her a couple times a week, in class or on campus... and you're really only just seeing.Sometimes they might raise their hand and say something witty that makes you laugh - but that isn't enough proof to say they are indeed funny and have the gift of humour. You're in class, watching them, just out of your reach and the gears in your head start turning. And then you get crazy ideas in your head like you can somehow turn your life into the perfect plot for an eighties movie. You get your buddy Quatre, your gal pal Hilde from your history class, her friend Sally... and you form a St. Elmo's troop that is hell-bent on uncovering the secrets of the Peacecraft Breakfast Club.

Alright, so it wasn't a Breakfast Club per say - honestly, they weren't that mixed up. There wasn't the one jock, the one pretty girl, the pre-Emo kid, the geek, and the rebel. They weren't so easily categorized - not that we didn't try. We wanted to lump them together so that it would be easier to figure out exactly why we couldn't have them - so we could just say, "They're out of our league," and it would be a totally righteous and informed answer.

The girls of the club consisted of Relena (of course), and her best friend and cousin, Dorothy Catalonia. Dorothy was her cousin on her father's side, but even after the Darlians divorced, the cousins stuck together. Though the parents burnt bridges, apparently the kids didn't follow suite. Maybe that's just a Winner attribute - not that I hold it against Quatre or anything. He's been my best friend since grade school. He even went to my public high school, when he could've gone to posh private school where he could've given me access to girls in uniform.

Again, I don't hold it against him; though we had fun with it. He would remind me of his sacrifice, and I would remind him of my loss.

The Peacecraft Brat Pack also included her boyfriend, Heero Yuy (of course), and his roommate at the time, Trowa Barton. They both bunked in the all-boys honours behind our residence - ours, being Quatre, mine, and the rest of our crew. Because we were first-years, we were stuck in the freshman co-ed dorms.

Well, _I_ was stuck there. Quatre could've opted out, but since we're in different programs and what not, it was easier when we lived on the same floor to keep in touch. Quatre starting out in Business Administration and me in English... Somehow, I didn't suspect we'd be in a lot of classes together. It's one of those things we didn't want to end up like... those kids who leave high school _saying_ they'll keep in touch and never do. Why? Because things happen.

Eventually, if you're too far apart, you can't keep up with each other on a day to day basis. Then you can barely keep up on a break to break basis at winter, spring, or summer. And then you're just meeting up at high school reunions, chatting about the good ol' days that you don't really ever think about otherwise. Neither of us wanted that for our friendship.

With the five of them walking together - Heero, Relena, Trowa, Dorothy, and Wufei - you'd think it was the girls were being escorted by their own personal Mod Squad. Quite frankly, the guys of the Pack all appeared to be overly serious in one way or another. Wufei's no-smile policy, Heero's diehard competitiveness, Trowa's silent treatment... they could've been poster children of the Revolution. I'd watch them walk across the grounds in perfect step with one another, half-expecting for a theme song to start playing as they went by. If Relena saw me, she'd nod or wave. I even heard her once tell them who I was, "Oh that's Duo, from one of my classes. I pretty sure he's an English major." I wouldn't shut up about it for the rest of the day, until Quatre finally hit me at the backside of my head. It wasn't a friendly tap either - he doesn't look like he has it in him, but if you hit a nerve, there is no telling what he's capable of.

On the flipside, if he's got a soft spot for you, there isn't anything he won't do for you. I'll never forget when we were ten and he took me to go see his new horse, Sandrock. We took Sandrock out grazing and I tripped, and my shoe came off and ended up in a creek. If you've ever been to a ranch, you may be aware that many of them come complete with long stretches of manure and horse excrement surrounding the stables. While we were trying to recover my shoe, Sandrock wandered back to the stables without us, and we were there with me with one shoe in hand and a field of shit to cross. Ten year-old Quatre, in the greatest iconic token of friendship that I can possibly fathom, carried me on his back over a field of shit. I swore to him that day that if I could ever return the favour, metaphorically or actually (preferably the former), I'd be at his beck and call.


	3. Part III

Sally was good at fishing information in the beginning, because her upperclassman buddy was Wufei's lab partner the year before. He was second-year Pre-med now, so technically only one year ahead of Sally. They were in one or two classes together for that year, and the next following. The buzz around the department was that Wufei's grandfather had been a recognized politician in China, not to mention a favourite relative to Wufei. But then he died of cancer - I forget which one, it wasn't a popular topic - I just know that it could've been cured if it was caught in time.

Our general consensus of these findings determined that he switched programs in hopes that he could prevent other people from losing their grandfathers - or well-meaning politicians - to cancer. Even if we asked him now about it, it kind of wouldn't seem right - to ask, I mean. "Oh, hey Wufei, did you switch programs 'cause of your dead grandpa?" Not exactly the best way to maintain relations. But if you think about it, it says a lot about Wufei's character. I mean, he could've just gone onto following in his grandfather's footsteps and paid homage that way - I don't doubt he would've been very successful. He could probably get people to vote for the abolition of sliced bread if he put his mind to it. But instead he chose to pursue medicine, heading for a life of non-profit cancer research - targeting the cancers with no found cure. Wufei's a stand-up guy, really, with a heart of gold - though you wouldn't know it from looking at him.

Since I first saw him, to present day, his appearance has not changed for the most part: his face is generally stoic, or scowling, behind the tiniest reading spectacles imaginable, and his hair is bound so tightly that you swear you can watch as his forehead slowly bald by the millisecond from the pull. If you ever caught him with his hair down, you were subject to a wide range of pain, because it meant you were someplace you weren't supposed to be. He, too, had resided in the honours dormitory along with Heero and Trowa.

All we knew about Trowa or how to get to Trowa were mostly rumours. The only people he ever talked to, if he did talk, were in his clique. I don't think it was because he was stuck up or anything... Sometimes you find people you're comfortable with and you stick with them. Quatre and I have been together nearly our whole lives and even though we talk to other people, it eventually comes back to the two of us at some point. So when we heard that Trowa and Heero had been dorm mates since freshman year, it was no big surprise. I'd have imagined Quatre and I planning it all out the same way.

The facts about Heero and Trowa that were common knowledge were that they were both on the track team, both on academic scholarships, and both in the honours society (obviously). Heero started dating Relena in first-year right up to when I met her. So Trowa would've been around for the whole courtship and everything else. There was a long period where I was _sure_, beyond a shadow of a doubt - if anyone could tell me what the hell it was about Heero Yuy that was so damned attractive to Relena Peacecraft, it would've been Trowa. Granted, that was when we could get him to speak... something he still doesn't do very much, I think, out of habit.

Quatre checked in with his family and his sisters, several of which were phenomenal gossips, to filch whatever information he could about Relena, Dorothy, or Heero. Sally kept tabs on Wufei, mostly for her own intentions to get her claws into him, while Hilde jumped across the board when she could. Sometimes she would hear an interesting titbit about Relena's stepbrother roaming around the History department. I think Hilde was just into it for the 80s Gen Y nostalgia element of it. I mean, it was kind of like we made our own drama and that became our lives. Although I remember getting on Quatre's last nerve whining about Relena, or dragging him and our friends into the crazy mixed up world of the honours society - I can always look back and smile 'cause I can think to myself, 'Well, at least I'm not _that_ young and stupid anymore.'

He also proved invaluable to our investigation with his marvellous talents for networking. Our side had the odds against us, after all. We were all first-years, so none of us were in the honours program, though we could apply for our second year. We didn't really know anybody yet, except maybe our upperclassmen buddies that administration paired us up with and each other. My upperclassman buddy was an eccentric engineering student who would only be addressed to as "S". I don't think he signed up for the buddy program for anything other than something to put in the volunteer section of his resume. It had to be a mistake, too; seeing as I'm signed up as an English student - what do I have to talk about with a guy in chemical engineering? So he wasn't much help at all. Quatre's, believe it or not, was some guy who got expelled at the last second for drug use or something... anyway, he didn't have one when we started out, though administration promised to assign him a new one before the end of term.

The girls of my St. Elmo's were infinitely luckier with buddy placement. Sally's was, as aforementioned, Wufei's ex-lab partner, Sylvia. They were affable from what I can remember, but I think Sylvia got tired of Sally pumping her for information.

Hilde's upperclassman buddy was a co-operative student who was working for course credit on campus. It turned out that she was a daughter of one of the head of the History department, though it wasn't exactly publicized anywhere. Whatever Hilde's buddy's connections could've leant our investigation - we weren't going to get any access to them. I guess when your dad is a department head - you learn to keep school and personal life separate to the _n_th degree. Hilde said she was glad she didn't know off the bat, 'cause she was just young and stupid enough to take advantage of the situation. They've remained close, though there was speculation in our second and third years as to _how_ close. After all, I couldn't help but think about it after being teased with the fantasy of girl on girl action in Relena's dorms.

Trying not to let the shower scene play in my mind was rather difficult when I would be sitting next to Relena in tutorial. She used this shampoo that smelled like some kind of perfume, like lilac or lavender or something with an "l" sound. Relena also has a tendency to toss her hair over her shoulder, particularly her left one, with me sitting directly to her left. I remember being very fond of baggy pants in those days; even if it meant sweating my balls off for the sake of hiding my semi-erect penis. Because young and stupid people get aroused over young and stupid things - not to say I don't still get aroused or anything, just not over young people - or well, very young people - what I mean is, over stupid things... stupid being a very relative term, which I can argue the semantics of till kingdom come thanks to my English degree. Anyway, I'm more than well aware of the fact that I was not the only person wearing baggy pants in those days, and I doubt I was the last.

I maintain to this day that as long as there are dicks in this world, they will get hard. As long as there are short skirts, tight jeans, irrepressible hormones, and Viagra - the madness will continue, forever and ever, Amen.


	4. Part IV

I wasn't stupidly brave enough to go to the source - namely Relena. Beyond the girl-on-girl rumours, there was also the risk of running into militant feminist quasi-Nazi faction that I'm sure every university has - big or small. Not that I have anything against feminism, power to you, but don't mind me if I don't want my nuts in the way of your picket signs. You have to appreciate extremists, though, because they don't turn their head enough to look back and are (hopefully) proactive in moving forward. But knowing what I could face behind those doors, there was no way I was going to get _close_ that dorm - no way, no how. So I settled for conveniently passing the track when Heero had practice and Relena would be on the benches with Dorothy. Sometimes I'd get a "Hi!" out of it, but most of the time... not really. They'd pass magazines or textbooks back and forth, glancing up at regular intervals to see if Heero was looking up to see them. Sometimes he would look up and wave or half-smile pant between sprints.

I don't think the girls were looking for a wave from Trowa, though often he'd be the one to get Heero to look up at the right times. Between runs, he'd nod up to the girls, or tap Heero's arm with the back of his hand. I think that was Trowa's way of teasing Heero out in the open. Other times, he'd nudge Heero with his elbow to tell him the coach was watching. Though I'm sure they could've gotten away with idling for a bit - after all, it wasn't exactly a secret that Heero and Relena were engaged. But like I said before - serious types.

I tried not to hang out there too often; Hilde warned me that it might seem creepy. After all, most of my wardrobe is black and on a sunny day, I stick out like a sore thumb. Again, if she ever noticed, she never called me on it. None of them did really, even in the long run. I guess we kind of understood a lot of why we did the things we did as we got older, though I'm still ironing out the details.

But Hilde also walked with me from history class back to the dorms, conveniently passing the track on our way. Conveniently at the time of practice. Conveniently nudging me to where Relena was on the benches and Heero was on the track. Every so often, her convenience earned her a nickname, like 7-Hileven - but we didn't plug that one for too long considering the open till midnight implications.

But she understood some things that Quatre and I just couldn't see eye-to-eye on. Like how I didn't care that I didn't have a chance in hell to get with her, but that I just liked to be around her. Just to look. Looking was safe. Looking was easy. Hilde didn't seem to mind at all. Between the benches and the track, we both had our share of eye candy.

Quatre's never been a looker, er, watcher. He's not a big doer as far as the pursuit goes, either, but if he's got his mind set, it's done. If he promises he'll do something, it's done. It's the great thing about him - even though he could probably have anything he wanted, he could be set for life in his dad's company, he could _buy_ love and loyalty... but he's pretty grounded to his loyalties. If Quatre ever had his eye on someone, it was going to happen. Regardless of how it would turn out, it was going to happen.

Sally was really Hilde's friend, but Hilde was my friend, so we did spend some time with her. She was applying to be in honours the next year and she was pre-med. Damn near impossible to get in touch with her sometimes, which frustrated Hilde. They'd been friends in high school and had the same plan of action as Quatre and me when it came to living arrangements. If you can't be together - live on the same floor and you're bound to bump into one another and stay in touch that way. The times we did hang out as a foursome, we'd have a good time. Sally and Quatre got along famously, since they both had a talent for picking on me. Most of it was tactful, so I took it all in stride. It's not like I don't know a few things about Quatre that he wouldn't want thrown back at him... so he's usually careful when it comes to pinning the tail on me.

Especially when it came to teasing me about Relena - it came to a point where I had to draw the line with him on that one. His sisters were too good at the gossip thing they did and some things about a person should be reserved for them to tell. I didn't want Quatre to tell me where and when she and Heero had sex, or where and when their parents caught them, or how she got when she got smashed that one weekend, or who she slept with before Heero... She wasn't perfect, nobody is - but nobody deserves that much bad PR on regular intervals.

She had some quirks, yeah, but most of those I would chalk up to just not getting out much. Meaning she went to Aspen for holidays, but never got off the mountain top. If you got her talking about world issues, domestic issues, or anything of that nature... her answers would sound verbatim out of a philosophy textbook. She's a trained speaker and delivers it well - so well, in fact, that you're convinced there's nothing else there but memorized data. Truth is, trained speakers learn where and when to speak; it's easier to hide one's true feelings behind cookie cutter templates.

But she wasn't quite at her peak yet. She sometimes wouldn't fall out of character - well, out of speaker. When it was just the two of us working on our project, it felt sometimes like she felt the audience was still there. I don't think she intended to seem so untouchable, or appear so artificial, but it was just a part of the delivery of most of the things she'd say.

We were going to do a presentation on Charles Dickens for our English class and the best times for both of us were when Heero had practice. Her schedule wasn't much more complicated than mine, but from what I could tell, the workload was a heck of a lot more. English isn't as easy as a lot of people write it off to be, but it is comparatively easy to other disciplines - especially if you have a talent for it. But she liked to participate in a bunch of student union things, or volunteer work. She said she tried to keep her schedule open for all opportunities. There were few times in her schedule where she could guarantee where she would be and when, except on the sidelines when Heero practiced. I didn't like it - I didn't want to watch them make eyes at each other back and forth - but it was the first opening I saw and I took it.

When we were deciding on our topic, she went into this whole explanation of the conditions of the Industrial Revolution and I nearly forgot she was in my English class, not in my History class. I didn't interrupt her or tell her that I knew most of what she was saying already because at the time I just wanted to hear her speak to me. Although, sometimes it felt more like she was speaking in my general direction. Dorothy was there once or twice, but I think sometimes it was awkward since we were supposed to be working - or because I wasn't in honours.

The first day we met up, she insisted I wave to Heero at least once. She would glance up, Trowa would cue him, Heero would look up, and she'd nudge me to wave with her. I did, awkwardly, reluctantly even. But she smiled for me, or at least at what I did, and that was enough to soften the blow. It was starting to get darker earlier those days in the fall, but I swear I caught Heero and Trowa passing a grin. It would probably look like I was another one of the helpless victims to Relena's presence. Which was true, but I didn't need two jock sprinters to make light of it. I guess they were used to that, too - and they were just playing their role.

Thankfully, Relena didn't persist too much after the initial wave. She'd told me that she'd mentioned we'd be working together. I only heard that she'd talked to Heero about me, and I don't remember feeling great – or entirely safe – about that. I could hear her say something like, "Oh he's just this freshman with absurdly long hair, nothing to be too concerned about." But I guess it was still necessary for me to wave to make sure he knew that I knew that he was there.


	5. Part V

The hair was a bit much when I got to university. In high school, people knew me long enough to know it was my trademark. They'd watched it grow. Sure, I got teased about it, but it was one of the perks of being friends with Quatre, class president four years in a row. I was vice for our junior year but friendship and quasi-politics don't mix. So arriving at the dorms with a braid down to my waist got a few questions.

I had to explain that psychological studies suggest that young kids do not handle haircuts very well. It has to do with the fact that some kids take longer to comprehend that you're not losing something important. Apparently, kids with issues with potty-training suffer from the same thing - they don't like seeing something separate from their bodies and subsequently disappear. Obviously, I didn't point out the potty bit because I didn't want that to hang all over me for the rest of my time in university, or subsequent reunions.

And I guess people bought it, or at least they got the idea that I didn't like questions about my hair. I'm not the most built guy in the world, but I'd like to think it's pretty clear that I'm a guy. Plus, there's another guy who does his hair in mini afros all over his head, trying to look like a Fraggle or something. Sometimes we pass each other and make eye contact and there's a silent understanding: Don't ask. Don't tell. Let them wonder.

Not that dressing in all black all the time didn't make people wonder, too. For my graduation present, Quatre bought me a set of t-shirts: two white, one blue, one red, and one tie-dye, just for hell. My first days around, getting all the weird looks that I remembered from being a tadpole back in high school... I seriously considered injecting some colour into my wardrobe.

And it had had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that Relena told me that I looked good in my red t-shirt for a change.

Meeting Two of our presentation get-togethers, it was raining out, so the guys all had to move to the indoor track and thus Relena and I had to move indoors, too. But because of some prank gone awry the year before, most of the bleachers were under reconstruction. The first few rows were okay, but the rest were covered in tarp. So I got a first-hand look at Heero and Trowa half grinning as they watched me suffer. I swear when Heero waved at Relena he was mimicking my pathetic nervous wave from the week before. But I just grit my teeth and bore it.

We'd never gotten a chance to decide on our topic because of Relena's previous lecture, so we were hashing through class notes and I made a couple suggestions. The assignment felt sort of high school - I mean, our tutorial assistant (T.A.) was a graduate student who smoked one too many in his undergrad. He was a smart guy and made sense most of the time, but he'd never taken the course before. It wasn't his field of expertise - he told us the first day he was doing his thesis on Early Shakespeare, which is hard to imagine his dissertation with his Keanu Reeves accent.

"Juliet was so totally bummed, yeah, about Romeo chugging the spice, right, so like she lay on his blade and it was _so_ done." My impersonation earned another giggle from Relena and I couldn't help but hope that Heero didn't hear it.

Not that I was any threat or anything. But I didn't exactly want to be put on his shit list unnecessarily – or at all. He's on track, so he's really lean, but it's all muscle. I'd watched him sprint at least a dozen times by then, both him and Trowa. Nobody can get from Point A to Point B with that long a stride and not have some serious power behind it. And no doubt if I got on Heero's bad side, I would be on Trowa's automatically. That would be two enemies for the price of one giggle. I haven't been beaten to a pulp in a while, but generally, as I recall... it's hard to wear a smile with your ribs kicked in.

I had to admit, even with direct contact, I wasn't pulling in my weight in the overall investigation. All I learned from sitting with Relena, talking about Dickens, was that she would've made a great English student if she decided to switch disciplines. I'm in English because I'm a detail freak - every word choice is important - and she gets that. I guess it's because when you're speaking, you have to be so careful that you say exactly what you want to be heard.

In fiction, I can't believe there's a lot that's accidental. Everything is there for a reason and it's ordered in a certain way to communicate a message. And she's all about Communications, so the nit-picky analyses I would digress into were never lost on her. Sometimes she'd join in and add things, too. But two meetings, general hellos when I passed by, but I had gotten no closer to getting to know her.

I would go back to the dorms, go to Quatre's and sulk. He'd do his homework, I'd occupy his bed. Face down, usually, with my face in a pillow, playing dead. It was right next to his desk, so he'd tap away at his laptop doing his assignments or playing on the internet. Every so often he'd reach over with his foot and kick me to see if I was still alive. He said I was getting too big to carry. (Cheeky bastard.) Eventually he'd finish whatever he was doing, come over, sit on my back, tell me that we have to go do something because he was bored now, and that was that. Quatre had spoken, and as it was said, so shall it be done. (Cue Thunderclap)

And it worked every damn time. A corner hotdog and a soda later, I'd be laughing stupid all over again. It was in this brief window when Quatre permitted me to quote-unquote "gush" about Relena Peacecraft. I knew he couldn't stand hearing about the girl - probably heard it _all_ from his sisters - but I could still smell her. I could be taking out the trash to the dumpsters and suddenly smell lavender. On any other occasion, if I mentioned this, Quatre dropped me back to earth with a smack upside my head. Had a way with him, that Quatre. Everybody thought he was an angel, especially the adults, but I knew. Oh, I knew.

I would tell him as much and he would hit me upside the head.

God love that cheeky bastard.


End file.
